Chapter 7 5 Bienvenu's cassock worn for too long

M. Myrière's domestic life was governed by the same ideas as his social life.To those who have had the opportunity to observe it closely, the self-effacing life that the Bishop of Digne led was austere and moving. Like all old men and most thinkers, he slept little, but his short sleeps were restful.In the morning he meditated for an hour and then said his mass, sometimes in the cathedral, sometimes in his own chapel.After Mass, he breakfasted on a loaf of rye bread dipped in the milk of his own cow.Then he got to work. The bishop is always quite busy, having daily interviews with the secretary of the diocese, usually a priest, and almost daily with his coadjutors.He had many councils to preside over, the whole religious library to examine, the Mass to be said, the catechism, the Office, etc.; There are disputes over academic affairs and administrative correspondence. One side is the government and the other side is religion. There are always endless things to do.

The time which was left over from those endless affairs and his daily offices and prayers, he spent first with the sick and suffering;Sometimes he shoveled in the garden, and sometimes he read and wrote.He had only one name for those two kinds of work, and he called it "farming." He said: "The mind is a garden." During the day, he eats lunch.Lunch was exactly like his breakfast. Around two o'clock, when the weather was fine, he went for walks in the country or in the town, often passing into shabby houses.He was seen walking alone, with his eyes downcast, leaning on a long walking stick, wearing his rather warm purple cotton robe, purple socks and clumsy shoes on his feet, and his flat cap on his head. Gold tassels dangled from the three corners of the hat.

Where he passed was like a festival.We can say that he is spreading warmth and light along the way.Children and old people all came to the gate for the bishop, as if welcoming the sunshine.He blesses everyone, and everyone blesses him.People always point out his place to anyone who needs it. Here and there he stopped, talking to little boys and girls, and smiling at mothers.As long as he has money, he always goes to the poor; when he runs out of money, he goes to the rich. Since he had been wearing Taoist robes for too long, but he didn't want others to notice, he had to put on the purple cotton robe when he entered the city.In the summer, that would be a little hard on him.

At half-past eight in the evening, he and his sister dined, with Madame Magloire standing behind them.It doesn't get any easier than that kind of dinner.But if the Bishop took one of his abbes for supper, Madame Magloire would take the opportunity to cook some delicious lake fish or expensive game for the Bishop.All the priests became excuses for the preparation of the feast, and the bishop was at the mercy of others.In addition, his daily meals are always nothing more than boiled vegetables and vegetable oil soup.People in the city said: "When the bishop doesn't eat the priest's food, he eats the monks' food of the order of ascetics."

After dinner, he chatted with Mademoiselle Magloire with Mademoiselle Baptistine for half an hour, and then retired to his room to write, sometimes on single pages, sometimes on the margins of folios.He was a man of letters, quite knowledgeable, and he left five or six rather peculiar manuscripts, one of which was a study of the section in "The Spirit of God Moving Over the Waters."He compares three texts: "The wind of God blows" in the Arabic translation; The explanatory translation is "A gust of wind from God blows on the waters".In another treatise he studies the works on theology of Hugo - Bishop of Putolimeis, great-uncle of the author; The various pamphlets should be the bishop's.

Sometimes, when he was reading, no matter what book he was holding, he would suddenly fall into deep thinking, and immediately write a few lines in the original book after thinking about it.Such a few lines often have nothing to do with the book in his hand.At present we have his notes in the margin of a quarto titled Correspondence of the Nobles German and Generals Clinton and Cornwallis and Admirals of the Seas of America, Panso de Versailles. Published in bookstores and Piso bookstore along the Augustin River in Paris. Note something like this: "Oh! You exist! "Ecclesiastes calls you Almighty, the Maccabees call you Creator, Ephesians calls you Freedom, Baruch calls you Greatness, Psalms calls you Wisdom and Truth, John calls you For light, Shahnameh calls you God, Lord, Leviticus calls you holy, Ezra calls you justice, you are called God, men call you Father, but Solomon calls you You are compassionate, and this is the most beautiful of your names."

Near nine o'clock the two women retired upstairs to their rooms, leaving him downstairs alone until morning.